


The Future they Earned

by onArete



Series: Taakitz Week 2018 [7]
Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: F/F, M/M, angst but with a happy ending, what happens when Taako dies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-07
Updated: 2018-10-07
Packaged: 2019-07-23 07:30:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 666
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16154450
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/onArete/pseuds/onArete
Summary: There's nothing fair about death.





	The Future they Earned

**Author's Note:**

> Day 7 of Taakitz Week 2018!!! From the prompt "Past, Present, Future." As I wrote this, I sort of forgot about writing about Past and Present, so... Future it is!!

Kravitz had never before thought of the Raven Queen as unfair.  She’d saved his soul from the Eternal Stockade when he was sacrificed by a cult.  She’d acted as practically his mother; giving him a home and relationship advice (even when he didn’t ask for it) and someone to introduce his husband to.  She gave him away at his wedding.

 

The whole point of death, of the Raven Queen’s domain, was that it was fair.  You lived, and you died. You lived and you died and you were happy in death. That was fair.

 

Taako’s death... Taako’s death wasn’t.

 

“Please, my Queen,” he said when he was brought before her.  “I can’t... Taako, he...”

 

I KNOW WHAT YOU ARE ASKING, KRAVITZ, she boomed.  AND I CANNOT GRANT YOU THIS REQUEST. TAAKO HAS LIVED HIS TIME.  DEATH IS ONLY FAIR.

 

“But... but this  _ isn’t _ ,” he said, voice breaking.  “I... he’s  _ gone _ , my Queen, and I don’t... I can’t...”

 

YOU HAVE LIVED THROUGH MILLENNIA BEFORE HIM, she replied.  YOU MAY STILL LIVE FOR MILLENNIA AFTER HIM. IT IS ONLY FAIR.

 

“I...” Kravitz hesitated.

 

WHAT DO YOU ASK?

 

“Why isn’t it fair for  _ me _ ?”

 

Kravitz hadn’t slept for four days and hadn’t eaten in at least a week. His eyes were red and rimmed in black.  He wasn’t even wearing a suit-- just pajama pants and an old t-shirt that is-- was-- Taako’s. It reads “Gayer than You”.  It’s ironic and colorful and so quinessianally Taako that Kravitz couldn’t bear to change out of it. He couldn’t remember if he’d put shoes on.

 

WHAT DO YOU MEAN, MY CHILD?  The Raven Queen bent down, shrinking a little as she did so, down to Kravitz’s eye level.

 

“It’s not  _ fair _ ,” he said, angry and weepy at the same time.  “Everyone else gets to die! Everyone else gets to go into the Sea of Souls and just...  _ die _ !  Be at peace!”

 

Something like a smile crossed her face.  YOU ARE NOT TRULY MAD AT ME, KRAVITZ. YOU SIMPLY DO NOT KNOW WHAT YOU ARE ASKING.

 

He was crying by then.  “So what  _ am  _ I asking?!”

 

KRAVITZ, WOULD YOU LIKE TO ENTER THE SEA OF SOULS WITH YOUR HUSBAND?

 

“I... what?”  Of everything his goddess could have said, he wasn’t expecting that.

 

WOULD YOU LIKE TO DIE?

 

It’s a horribly fatalistic question that he knew the answer was supposed to be “no”.  But the rules didn’t really apply then, not when Taako was in the Sea and Kravitz wasn’t and nothing was right in the world.

 

“Will I get to be with Taako?” he asked, tears streaked down his face, staring up at his Queen with desperation, love.

 

OF COURSE, MY CHILD.  

 

“Then... yes.  I do. I do want to... to see him again.”

 

She smiled, bowed her head.  A benediction, a blessing.

 

GO FORTH IN PEACE, KRAVITZ.  YOU HAVE SERVED ME WELL.

 

The Raven Queen kissed his forehead, and Kravitz was gone.

 

\--------------------------------------

 

Kravitz had been in the Sea of Souls exactly once before, on the day of Story and Song.  When it was filled with the Hunger and tried to swallow him alive and he was cut off from Taako and his goddess.  When everything went wrong, and the world fell apart.

 

This time, though, the Sea was calm.  Still. Peaceful in a way he hadn’t realized he’d been craving.  He flew in almost joyfully, heart brimming with a unknown wish finally fulfilled.

 

“About time, thug,” said a soul that Kravitz recognized as well as his own.  “I missed you.”

 

“I missed you too, Taako,” Kravitz replied.  “I love you so so much.”

 

“Aw, you sap,” he smiled.  “I love you too. I’m glad you’re here.”

 

Souls in the Sea don’t have physical forms, not really.  But if those two did, the whole plane would’ve seen them embrace, perfectly formed around each other.  

  
  


\--------------------------------------

 

A plane away, Istus smiled to her wife as she pulled two strands of threat taut.  “I’m glad it all worked out. This is the future they earned.”

  
  



End file.
